Heartfelt tribute paid to Aloysius Pang at Star Awards

A montage of photos from when Mr Pang was a young boy, videos of him at work and more recent photos of him along with his fans was shown as the song Voices From The Heart was played, featuring Mr Pang’s own voice

Singapore—The showbiz world showed on Sunday night, April 14, that although actor Aloysius Pang is gone too soon, he has not been forgotten. Part of Star Awards 25’s ceremony was a heartfelt tribute to Mr Pang, who died in a national service training incident in January at the age of 28.

Sunday night’s celebration was an important one for Mediacorp since it marks the 25th anniversary since the awards began in 1994. Amidst the glamour was one poignant moment when a tribute was made to the deceased actor.

A montage of photos from when Mr Pang was a young boy, videos of him at work and more recent photos of him along with his fans was shown as the song Voices From The Heart was played, featuring Mr Pang’s own voice. His friends from show business, Xu Bin, Timothee Yap, Zong Zijie and Gavin Teo, sang the song as well.

Interspersed with the montage, the video of the tribute showed other teary-eyed colleagues from the entertainment industry, including Dasmond Koh, who had been Mr Pang’s manager, and Mr Pang’s own girlfriend actress Jayley Woo.

At the end of the montage, the video of the awards night showed Mr Pang’s brothers, who also attended the ceremony as they had been told of the tribute.

Aloysius Pang—his life, career, and death

Mr Pang, who started out as a child actor at the age of nine, had been nominated for several awards as a child and in his adulthood. He had also been a singer, a presenter, and later made his foray in directing music videos. Additionally, he had gone into business with one of his brothers.

As an actor, he was thought to be one of the most underrated performers of his time, due to his considerable talents. And he was also known to allocate 10 percent of his salary specifically for the people who worked on the production crew of his projects.

After his death, actress Felicia Chin said, “This kind little boy would set aside 10 percent of his pay to thank and bless the production people … He had a heart of gold, especially for the older folk … Aloy is very loved, missed and adored by many people.

Mr Pang participated in a live-firing exercise at Waiouru Training Area in New Zealand in January of this year. During an exercise on January 19, he went into the cabin of a Singapore Self-Propelled Howitzer to check on the gun mechanism. When the barrel of the gun was lowered, it hit Mr Pang in the chest and abdomen and caused him serious injuries. Despite several surgeries, Mr Pang died in hospital on January 23.

An outpouring of grief from the general public occurred upon his death, with calls for the re-examination of how safe training procedures are in the training for national servicemen.

Dasmond Koh’s speech

Mr Pang’s manager, Dasmond Koh, was among the Top 10 Most Popular Male Artiste at the Star Awards again on Sunday night. By next year, he will be inducted in the All-Time Favourite Artiste club.

Mr Koh dedicated his speech to his departed protege.

When asked if this was something he had planned previously, he said to 8 Days, “I thought that this could be a platform where I could say thank you on his behalf, as well, for me to express gratitude to all the people whom I have never seen before or even know who they are, but they were there with him during the last few days.”

Mr Koh admitted that he had gotten very emotional during the tribute to Mr Pang. And due to his elation because of his Top 10 win, he described his feelings as “fluctuating” and “surreal.”

He explained to 8 Days that the first and last singing voice on the video was indeed that of Mr Pang and that he and the quartet of Noon Talk artistes had all worn black because of him./ TISG